I frequent the Moe's on E. Blvd a good bit with my family.  Scum bag ex-employee comes in and kills 2 employees.  I guess he thought his life would not get worse than making tacos in a hot kitchen.  His mother on the news, commenting on his being fired or something says he must have been backed in corner and "sooner or later he gone come out..." .  Anybody else hear anything?

I work a few blocks from there.
I heard the same thing on WBT this morning on the way into work.
Sounds like the mother is making him out to the victim while conveniently forgetting that he murdered two innocent men, one of which left behind three kids.
It is my hope that he gets the death penalty.

I've been following the story, and wanted to post about it, but have held off, out of respect to the families.

Sometimes, when I hear of these types of events, I do feel so badly for the victims and their families, but a couple things happen to me.

I have already had my personal moments of grief, and sometimes don't wish to relive them again at the time I happen to be online.

Then part of me gets angry, but has a hard time finding a positive way to vent my frustration, so I'm afraid I'm going to say something that may seem insensitive so shortly after an event like this happening.

For example, one of the first things I did was look up the menu at Moe's. I've gotten out of the habit of going to these types of restaurants, as my wife's not a big fan for southwestern food, so I've never been to Moe's. Anyway, according to the web site, they sell beer, which is normally a good thing, except for anyone wanting to legally CCW in NC or SC. This has been a real issue for me since getting my CWP this year, and taking an active interest in protecting myself and my family.

Any day my wife is working through the week usually involves me getting my daughter from school, and often getting either some take-out, or eating at a restaurant. Or when they're doing their thing, and I'm on my own, or out w/ the guys, I'm gonna eat out before I cook. Having long been over fast food, when at all possible, I try to get a relatively *real* meal somewhere, and many of these places sell alcohol for consumption on premises, thus legally barring one from taking their legal CCW inside.

So, therefore, when going to school, or to one of these restaurants, you're faced to deal w/ these issues of either going out for a considerable amount of time, potentially making other stops, and being w/out any protection (from a firearm anyway), or you have to unconceal it, which has varying degrees of difficulty, depending on how you're dressed, and how concealed it is, and putting it away safely in the vehicle somewhere, which for some makes the weapon vulnerable, even if locked in a vehicle, and you may be in a parking lot, out in the open, trying to discretely and safely transition from CCW to securing the firearm in the vehicle, while your kid or other members of your family are present, or nearby, and passer's by may be able to get a glimpse, God help you if you don't have tinted windows like I do, all the while taking a loaded firearm in and out of concealment, etc.

Anyway, aside from those annoyances, now you enter the establishment w/out your firearm, all because they sell beer, even though while carrying you won't be indulging, and you could be in a situation where a robbery takes place, or something like this horrible situation at Moe's. The reports indicated that the assailant did point the weapon at other people in the restaurant, but as far as I know, the only people that were shot, or at least hit, were the employees that he knew, but this could have easily turned into something even more devastating, where he took a lot more lives than he did.

On top of that, we are all very lucky that a Sheriff was nearby w/ that funeral procession, and other first responders were not far behind to apprehend the loser that committed the attack, otherwise, again, it could have been much worse, and he could have gotten away.

Someone mentioned that attacker wasn't afraid of being stopped or thwarted in his attempt because the usual crowd on this side of town may not be the gun toting type, but I told them it wouldn't have mattered, because any law abiding citizen would likely not be carrying in there, since they couldn't legally do so, if this place does in fact sell beer. My point is that it upsets me that I can't go to these places and protect myself from some random act of violence, since based on my lifestyle, it seems to me I'm at the greatest risk of running into someone committing a violent act at some kind of public place like a gas station, or a restaurant/bar, IMO.

Anyway, I don't want to reduce the real tragedy here into a political thing, or a guns rights thing, my condolences do go out to the families, and I too hope the guy gets fried, but I can't help but feel some concern when I see something like this happen at a nice hang out spot, where good people go, in the middle of the freakin day for crying out loud, and to know that so many of these places are off limits to a law abiding citizen when he wants to legally protect himself and those around him, when obviously, this guy, who is a criminal now, was able to slip under the radar to buy a gun legally, since he had nothing on his record at that time, but who was predetermined to go commit a murder, had no regard for the law forbidding him to carry his weapon onto the property. I hope enough people also feel the same way, and eventually we can make some changes.

Again, I can't stress enough my condolences to the victims and their families, of this, and every other tragic victim of violence as senseless as this.

Regards,

Karz

The first news reports were "shooting at a kinko's Uptown", being that Mrs 1035's office is across the street from Kinko's on Tryon, I was sufficiently wigged out.

When it came out what actually happened, and that it was not uptown, but about 5 minutes from our house, I'm still wigged out.

106.5 is in the midst of doing auctions to benefit the victims' families. A signed guitar from the red hot chili peppers fetched $2700 tonight. There will be online auctions tomorrow, I believe.

Just passing along what I heard on the radio on the ride crawl home.

Also for the upcoming Charlotte Checker's season opener at home, if you call to order tickets and mention Moe's, half of the ticket price is going to the families of the victims, and I don't mean the perp.

Plus, Checkers games are awesome!